So many problems in our community and the greater society seem to languish, becoming monstrous, almost insurmountable issues before anything ever gets done to address them.
Why?
Well, most of the time we just don’t know about them, or we aren’t listening to those who’ve been speaking up. In our over-saturated society, everyone is clamouring for attention, rightly so, on issues as pervasive as the opiate epidemic, cancer, domestic violence, sexual harassment and abuse, corruption, and the overall lack of resources for the agencies and organizations tasked with rooting out those problems.
It’s telling that each month of the year is the “awareness month” for a multitude of issues. October is the month for Breast Cancer Awareness and Domestic Violence Awareness, among others that the Sun honored this year with our first Awareness Issue.
Breast cancer is an issue that affects so many women, no matter their age, race, or class. Cancer is a battle, as anyone who’s fought the disease will tell you, so when an unlikely aid in the fight comes along, like art therapy (see page 12), it’s up to all of us to let it be known. That’s the responsibility that we take seriously at the Sun, to do more than just report on the problems, but illuminate solutions and helpful measures as well.
But it’s also on us to give voice to those who may have been overlooked, as illustrated in this week’s School Scene (page 10). When a local mother who lost her son to pediatric cancer has to point out the disparity in federal research funding for childhood cancer, it shows a lack of awareness by not just citizens, but all the way to lawmakers.
I’m not condemning anyone for their lack of awareness, far from it, but just trying to give a voice to those who don’t have resources to lobby or command the national discourse. Anyone can be ignorant of the multitude of problems in a community, but it’s on all of us to become aware of those issues, and especially the solutions.
For instance, many in Santa Maria, Lompoc, and Santa Barbara might not know there are shelters waiting for those fleeing intimate partner violence run by Domestic Violence Solutions (see page 8), or that if they donate or shop at New Image Thrift Store in Santa Maria that they’re supporting that organization. Well, now you know, and can shout it from the rooftops, but sometimes just awareness isn’t enough.
Domestic Violence Solutions has led the charge in not just educating us on domestic violence and how pervasive it is in our community, but calling on us to do something about it. The organization’s social media campaign this month includes hashtags like #BeAnUPstander, #TakeAStand, and #SurvivorSpeaks. It’s on everyone, they argue, to help end the cycle of domestic violence and report it to law enforcement.
Thankfully, some powerful people are listening. Santa Barbara County District Attorney Joyce Dudley told the Sun last October that domestic violence was a major focus for her and her office. It was the most common violent crime across the county, she said, and one of the most predictable causes of homicide.
“As we know in law enforcement, if it’s predictable, it’s preventable, so why aren’t we doing more to prevent domestic violence homicides in Santa Barbara County?” she said at the time.
There were four homicides in 2017 that involved domestic violence across the county, which Dudley described as a crisis. So far there haven’t been any this year, which says a lot for an increased focus from law enforcement, but also for campaigns calling on people to report and speak up.
A similar issue that flew under the radar for so long was human trafficking, a problem that police and lawmakers haven’t just turned their focus to, but redefined in recent years. Law enforcement used to arrest and charge minors with prostitution, which doesn’t make much sense considering so many were pimped by adults and minors aren’t legally able to give consent to sex under the law.
Our area’s state Assemblymember Jordan Cunningham (R-San Luis Obispo) has made human trafficking central to his legislative work, calling it “one of the biggest moral issues of our time” at an informational meeting he held in Santa Maria this April.
Cunningham isn’t just raising awareness, but authoring bills to help combat human trafficking that pull on his experience as a prosecutor. One bill, signed by Gov. Jerry Brown in July, gives prosecutors more options in prosecuting traffickers by protecting initial statements made by victims of trafficking.
I wish these same lawmakers and prosecutors would turn more attention to an issue hardly anyone wants to talk about or address: sexual abuse by Catholic priests.
A national law firm issued a massive report on Oct. 2 that details sexual assault allegations against more than 300 of the Catholic Church’s priests in California and the bishops who moved them around for decades (see page 4).
The Archdiocese of Los Angeles encompasses all the Catholic churches in the county, including missions La Purisima, Santa Ines, and Santa Barbara. Many of our county’s churches, seminaries, and all of the missions housed priests, lay staff, or volunteers who faced allegations of sex crimes against children or young adults, some going back as far as 1936.
One priest, Father Timothy Lane, was the subject of a Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office investigation after an alleged sexual assault of a St. Joseph High School student in 2006. The District Attorney’s Office didn’t file charges because of insufficient evidence, but the Sheriff’s Office was only alerted of the alleged crime after the Archdiocese did its own investigation. Lane was conveniently on leave out of state when the county investigation began, but he never left St. Joseph’s seminary–he’s still there today.
This is a pattern that’s been repeated across not just the United States, but the entire planet when it comes to allegations of abuse by Catholic priests. Unfortunately, the church is not a reliable investigator in terms of child abuse by clergy, but reliably protects priests over their victims.
But why hasn’t more been done to hold the church accountable? Why is it on a group of lawyers to conduct this kind of widespread investigation? Law enforcement is tasked with investigating one crime at a time, but how many of these crimes have to pile up before criminal conspiracy is provable?
I don’t know the answer, but I do know it’s on us all as citizens and journalists to do our own investigating and, most importantly, speak up when we witness something or someone else tells us of a possible crime.
The truth will come out, and when it does, do you want to be the person who was aware but said and did nothing?
The Canary will always speak out. Send your thoughts to canary@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Oct 4-11, 2018.